


Miles to Go Before I Sleep

by smolintj



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pining, Safe For Work, diner au, klance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-19
Updated: 2017-07-19
Packaged: 2018-12-04 09:57:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11552769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smolintj/pseuds/smolintj
Summary: Keith, a trucker, has a favorite stop along his route. Although it may seem innocuous, Keith will make any excuse to stop off at Tom's Diner in Langston, a diner indistinguishable from any other except for a certain waiter Keith has taken a fancy to, and it seems the feeling is mutual.





	Miles to Go Before I Sleep

“Knives? There’s an accident up on 35, around mile marker 245, four-ten? I know you’re headed that way,” the voice crackled out over the CB, making a dent in the radio noise turned up loud in the cab.

“Ten-four Al, I got you. Gonna be stopping soon, but thanks for the head’s up” Keith replied, returning his handheld mic to its clip on the ceiling deftly. His eyes wandered to the mile markers flashing by in his headlights. Nearly there. 

Langston, Texas, was a town no one should hope for. It was a trucker’s stop, with a few gas stations bordered by a bar or two, a 24 hour diner, and a little smattering of houses and businesses that didn’t see much traffic. It sat on a lonely stretch of Interstate 35, between Dallas and Austin, in the shrubby dry lands of the area. And Keith was itching to get there.

Not because it’d been a long drive, although it had. Keith’s 11 hour shift was nearly up, his eyes blurring the dashed lines on the road slightly in his headlights. But he was used to this. The soft rumble of the engine, the flat expanse of road stretching out into the distance, and a sliver of moonlight poking out between clouds. Langston itself was a shithole, but Keith couldn’t help smiling at what he knew he could find there. Trucker’s fantasy, he supposed, but it was something to think about on the long roads. How quick he was to smile, the soft blush that rose to his cheeks when he laughed, the way he leaned against the counter, annoying the cooks when hours were slow.

Keith glanced quickly at the dashboard beside his steering wheel, faintly illuminated in green by the dashboard lights (speed, oil, gas, temperature), and saw the hastily taped-up picture there.

Last month, Lance had gotten employee of the month, which meant they’d put up a photo of him smiling, slightly embarrassed, on the wall. A photo Keith had snapped a picture of to hang in his cab, hoping that it’d remind him of good times when the hours got long. It’d worked.

 

Keith smiled at his little photo and revved the gas a little over the speed limit. They’d been flirting for months, from Keith tipping egregious amounts to Lance memorizing all of his orders and preferences. At first the other waitstaff had tried to muscle in on Keith’s tipping habits, only to realize that while he tipped politely, he wasn’t nearly as flustered by them.

At last! The exit sign! Langston. Tonight, Keith told himself, he was going to do it. He was officially going to ask Lance out. Where? He had no idea. But he needed to reassure himself that Lance didn’t linger by his table, chatting and leaning on the edge, hand outstretched, without hinting at more.

The tacky lights were visible from the exit ramp, announcing “Tom’s Diner: Open 24 Hours!” in neon for anyone who cared to see, featuring a cartoon chef smiling from afar and holding up a frying pan. It was standard diner fare. Sleepy, gossippy waitstaff, greasy breakfast food served all day and night, the tables smelling faintly of ammonia from their last wipe, a vaguely but noncommittal 50s aesthetic. A reliable chain of havens smattered across the countryside for lonely travellers. 

The air brakes whooshed as Keith slid his rig to a stop in the long 18-wheeler spaces at the edge of the diner’s parking lot, cutting the engine, and with it, the radio.

Keith rolled down the window, smelling the air. It was a warm night in July, not too humid, with a soft breeze circling.

Over the pops and tings of metal cooling, the soothing sounds of the highway could be heard in the distance, more trucks with more drivers speeding past, one after another, for miles and miles and miles, all passing by places they assumed were interchangeable.

Keith grinned as he stretched his arms out before him, hearing his shoulders crackle a bit with the motion. This greasy spoon felt like home now, it didn’t matter if the food was bad, or the highway loud to sleep near at night, or Langston being unhelpfully far from anywhere useful. It mattered that Lance smiled here. And it mattered that in a few minutes, Keith would smile back.

But not quite yet. Cautiously, Keith took a suspicious sniff of the front of his t-shirt, wrinkling his nose. New shirt, definitely. More deodorant. Crouching, Keith stepped into the back of the cab, opening the drawer under his cot and rummaging, pulling out a soft red checkered flannel. Good enough? Better than what he was wearing, at least.

Quickly Keith shrugged off his shirt and changed, grabbing a deodorant stick and applying liberally. Glancing in the mirror above his bed, he mussed his hair hopefully, but unfortunately it refused to cooperate, keeping its standard layered flop of a mullet just as before. Keith wished his eyes didn’t look so tired, but there wasn’t much to be done about it. A few last attempts to correct his wayward hair only made things worse so he gave up. 

He was nervous. He’d swore to himself that tonight he’d ask. Once and for all. And to be fair, Lance hadn’t been subtle in his affection for Keith. He’d laugh at all his jokes, add extra chocolate to his milkshakes, once even drew a heart on his receipt as he returned it.

That receipt was taped to the dashboard next to Lance’s picture.

But Keith couldn’t stop himself from worrying. What if Lance acted this way with all his customers? Keith knew he was a showman, so what made Keith different from anyone else?

He was about to find out, hopefully. He found himself doing busy tasks to keep himself from going into the diner. Straightening his stack of worn paperbacks, brushing crumbs off the small table and tossing them out the still open window, checking that his keys were still in his jeans pocket. But he had to go eventually. It was getting late, close to midnight.

Alright, time to go. Keith looked himself in the eye in the mirror, steeling himself. Out loud, he said, trying to project confidence in his voice, “Listen. You are going to ask a boy out.”

Even the words didn’t seem real. Who was he to ask anyone out? Let alone Lance, of all people? But no, he was gonna do it. If he didn’t do it soon, Lance might think he’d been flirting with no intention. He took a breath to steady himself.

“You, Keith Kogane, are going to ask a boy out. Tonight. And not just any boy. The boy.”

Before he could think about it any longer, Keith rolled up his window, swung out of the driver’s side door and locked his cab behind him, headed towards the diner, hoping that wearing a flannel wasn’t a mistake if he started sweating from nervousness.

The dim yellow streetlamps seemed to only make the wide lit windows of the diner more enticing, drawing Keith in. His heart jumped as he saw a long silhouette. Lance! He was scribbling hurriedly on a notepad, taking someone’s order. Keith couldn’t see it, but he knew Lance was sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth while he wrote. He’d be laughing and joking with the customer, trying to cheer them up even after a long day of working himself. He’d have dimples in his cheeks and his notepad of orders would be illegible to everyone except, miraculously, the cook (and Keith, of course). He wore silly hand-pressed buttons from clippings he made all over his work apron, ranging from words to celebrities to waterfall scenes to video game consoles, all jingling in a dazzling array of confusion.

Keith hardly noticed as he pushed open the door, ringing a small bell, greeted by the warm wafting smells of pancakes, fry oil, and eggs. The bright lights reflected off faux-chrome surfaces, but nothing could have been as bright as the sight of Lance instinctively glance towards the door and grin when he saw Keith standing there. Temporarily distracted, Keith watched as he scrambled to catch up on the order he was taking, only to quickly whisk it back to the kitchen and roll up to the greeting kiosk. 

“Everything okay out there?” Lance asked, and Keith merely nodded, trying to keep his smile subtle. Lance continued, “You were, ah, later than usual. I was,” Lance glanced away, pretending to organize some menus, “I was worried you weren’t coming.”

Lance’s bright blue eyes met Keith’s as he looked up, the implicit question hanging over them. “Construction slowed me down,” Keith responded, and when Lance still looked expectant, he added, “Of course I was coming.”


End file.
